PORT ANGELES — To keep patrol deputies fighting crime in the field instead of holed up indoors, the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office is using a federal grant to purchase 17 mobile data terminals for its patrol cars.
The enhanced laptop computers will let deputies file reports, send and receive images, run background checks and communicate with dispatchers and each other from their cars.
County commissioners will consider a personal services agreement with Greenville, S.C.-based Synnex Corp. for the devices today.
The $82,953 agreement is funded through a $525,904 Stonegarden grant, which is used to support the efforts of the Department of Homeland Security.
Ron Cameron, Sheriff’s Office chief criminal deputy, said the rest of the grant will be spent on deputy training and overtime assistance for the Border Patrol.
Eventually, the Port Angeles and Sequim police departments will add the grant-funded mobile data terminals to their crime-fighting arsenals, Cameron said.
Most urban law enforcement agencies already use them.
“It’s very much a 21st century law enforcement technology,” Cameron said.
Cameron added that computer connectivity is a challenge in rural areas, and the Sheriff’s Office may set up designated “hot spots” for connectivity to be used in conjunction with Internet sticks for laptop computers.
“We want to be able to keep guys in the field working and not in the office typing as much as possible,” Patrol Sgt. Grant Lightfoot told commissioners in Monday’s work session.
“And we also want to be able to have the flexibility to work wherever we can, or wherever we want — wherever it’s safe to do so.”
One advantage of the $5,000 mobile data terminals is to ease pressure on PenCom dispatchers, who handle all 9-1-1 calls in Clallam County.
Last year, PenCom dispatchers handled 32,019 9-1-1 calls and about 37,000 calls from law enforcement and fire agencies.
As information comes into Port Angeles Police Department-based dispatch center, the new technology will export the information to the data terminals in patrol cars, Lightfoot said.
The computers are equipped with global positioning systems, or GPS, with maps to show dispatchers where each patrol car is located.
Law enforcement and fire agencies on the East and West Ends of the county will work together on one communications frequency, Lightfoot said, which should help improve response times.
“The way it is now, if I’m driving down Front Street [in Port Angeles] and there’s an armed robbery happening, because of the dispatch I could drive right by it,” Lightfoot said.
The Sheriff’s Office and PenCom will standardize the mobile data terminals, with installation going to bid later this summer.
PenCom is funded by the 17 law enforcement, fire and emergency service agencies that use it.
The agencies that use PenCom are the Port Angeles police and fire departments; the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office; Sequim police; Clallam Fire Districts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6; Lower Elwha Tribal Police; Forks police; LaPush police; Jamestown Fish and Game; Forks Ambulance; Olympic Ambulance; and Olympic National Park.
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.